Law Library

Using Digests

Digests are multi-volume, bound sets that act as case-finding tools. The purpose of digests is
to find cases relevant to the issue you are researching within a particular jurisdiction and subject
area. GSU College of Law Library has digests that are tied to specific case reporters, which are
publications that contain court opinions. These digests are:

• The Supreme Court Digest (accompanying the Supreme Court Reporter)
• Regional reporter digests
  • South Eastern Digest (accompanying the South Eastern Reporter)
  • The Atlantic, North Western, and Pacific reporters have digests, but they are
    not available at the Law Library. The North Eastern Reporter, South Western
    Reporter, and Southern Reporter do not have digests. To find cases in those
    reporters, you would need to consult the digests of the individual states that
    are within those regions. However, the Law Library only has Georgia’s state
    digest.
• Georgia Digest (accompanying Georgia Reports and Georgia Appeals Reports)

The digests are located:

• Supreme Court Digest: row 16
• South Eastern Digest: rows 28 & 81
• Georgia Digest: rows 3 & 4

In order to find cases, you need to identify the topic it is listed under. To do so:

1. Find your topic (and associated key numbers) in the Descriptive Word Index.
2. Pull the volume that contains cases on your topic. Topics are in alphabetical order
   (for example, volume 1 has topics that start with A).
3. Find the pages that cover your key number.
4. Read the case summaries under the key numbers to find relevant cases.
5. To read the full cases, go to the case reporters indicated by the case citation.
   Citations are explained in the Law Library guide “Locating Cases by Citation.”
6. Are your cases good law? Use Shepard’s online. See a reference librarian if you need
   help with Shepardizing, or if you are prompted to enter a password.

This Research Guide was last updated November 2, 2005.